Defending Cat, again

[David Selig]

Ignoring him was a sick kind of psychological torture that Catelyn deliberately inflicted on Jon.

Overreacting much? She's not her mother or stepmother. So she has no reason to take care of him. It's unfortunate that Jon lacked a mother figure, but that's not Cat's fault.

[ARYa_Nym]

"Jon," she said. Have should have kept going, but she had never called him by his name before...It should have been you."

The only reason why this even happened was because he was startled that she finally acknowledged that he had a name. It was especially unnecessary because he was already leaving the room.

There is a certain point when being bitter just becomes pathetic. This is the main reason why I don't like Littlefinger. Cat reminds me of him with her attitude towards Jon.

[brashcandy]

Overreacting much? She's not her mother or stepmother. So she has no reason to take care of him. It's unfortunate that Jon lacked a mother figure, but that's not Cat's fault.

Just calling it like it is. Refusing to utter a child's name and acknowledge their existence is an evil mind game, and no one was asking her to be a mother to Jon (although it wouldn't have been impossible] but merely to be kind to a boy that didn't ask to be born. Mind you, I blame Ned for this whole mess too. He could have owned up to the whole thing and/or dealt with Catelyn in a better manner when she asked about Jon, but he chose to go for the "how dare you question me" route, basically leaving Jon defenceless to Cat's wrath. Anyhow, I know some people don't see anything wrong with how Cat behaved, and that's fine, but I think she began showing her Lady Stoneheart tendencies long before the Red Wedding.

[Errant Bard]

Just calling it like it is.

You might want to have a word with GRRM then:

Thus, the question I have is if Catelyn went out of her way to mistreat Jon in the past -- and which form this might have taken -- or if she rather tried to avoid and ignore him?

"Mistreatment" is a loaded word. Did Catelyn beat Jon bloody? No. Did she distance herself from him? Yes. Did she verbally abuse and attack him? No. (The instance in Bran's bedroom was obviously a very special case). But I am sure she was very protective of the rights of her own children, and in that sense always drew the line sharply between bastard and trueborn where issues like seating on the high table for the king's visit were at issue.

And Jon surely knew that she would have preferred to have him elsewhere.

[little_horn]

I think the fact that she kept alienating Jon all his life in Winterfell is just a character flaw, she NEVER FORGETS, which is interesting because it's a trait I think Arya inherited from her.

[Geddus]

Before being the spurned lover, Petyr was her childhood friend. She did care for him, just not the way he wanted. So again, someone that she knew and trusted for years over someone whose family she knows is at least antagonistic if not out right against.

Yes, she considered him a friend when she was younger; however, she now knows he was in love with her, and not in a harmless, puppy love way since he challenged Brandon to a duel over it; duel that ended up with Petyr severely hurt and severely humiliated. After this, she doesn't see him for almost 20 years and she still trusts him blindly. That's naive at best.

And I wasn't talking about trusting Tyrion's words over LF's, I was talking about trusting LF, period. When he told her about the dagger, she had no doubts and on that basis only she proceeded in kidnapping Tywin Lannister's son. I don't think it's unreasonable to criticize her for it.

[Ser Tom]

No, you are in exactly the right thread.

People keep dumping a whole bunch on Catelyn, often to the point of derailing other threads. Yet their reasoning, and often facts, for doing so are woefully inadequate. The point of this thread is to bring them out and shoot them down.

Which part of that post was shooting down anything I said?

[mediocre cheese]

Yes, a lady of noble birth, marrying into the North's most powerful family allowing her husbands' bastard to live, eat, learn and train with his trueborn sons & daughters is just woeful parenting. How many other noble families in Westeros are homes to the lords bastards? .

I want to point out this is wrong. The freys, martells, and lannisters all allow there bastard children to live at the ancestral home, and are given various roles as part of the family.

The weird thing to me is why Ned never fostered Jon out. Ned himself was fostered, as are many young nobles, including lord hornwood's bastard. It would get Jon away from catelyn and I imagine any one of his vassals (manderly, umber, mormont, flint, Tallhart) would have been happy to take Jon.

[BrosBeforeSnows]

I think Cat proves that (most) women would make terrible warlords. They'd probably be better rulers than men, for a time, until you start pulling on their mommy strings, and then they start doing all kinds of stupid, irrational shit in order to protect their babies. Men are much more cold and uncaring (probably because we don't have to carry a pregnancy to term and pop out a little human after 9 months).

Take Stalin for example. When the Nazis captured his son, they offered to trade him in exchange for Hitler's nephew (whom the Russians had captured). Stalin basically called his son a weakling, and said his life was worth no more to him than any other Russian's life. But you know if Mamma Stalin had still been alive, that trade would've gone down in a heartbeat. Refusing the exchange didn't necessarily serve a purpose, but it does prove that Stalin was a cold, uncaring dickhead.

But don't get me wrong, mother's intuition can indeed be a life-saver, but it can also lead to irrational decisions based on fear. I think Cat exemplified both ends of that spectrum pretty well. Someone tried to kill her baby, and she basically ran around like a chicken with her head cut off. Ned was similarly pissed about Bran, but he didn't become frantic like she did. Had she sat back, taken a deep breath, and thought it through, it would've become plainly obvious to her that Tyrion never would've armed an assassin with his OWN dagger, nor would he have bet against his beloved brother, etc... But instead, she was grasping at straws and immediately jumped on the first explanation she was offered, in a misguided attempt to keep her babies safe (which ultimately led to their destruction instead).

[mediocre cheese]

I think Cat proves that (most) women would make terrible warlords. They'd probably be better rulers than men, for a time, until you start pulling on their mommy strings, and then they start doing all kinds of stupid, irrational shit in order to protect their babies. Men are much more cold and uncaring (probably because we don't have to carry a pregnancy to term and pop out a little human after 9 months).

Take Stalin for example. When the Nazis captured his son, they offered to trade him in exchange for Hitler's nephew (whom the Russians had captured). Stalin basically called his son a weakling, and said his life was worth no more to him than any other Russian's life. But you know if Mamma Stalin had still been alive, that trade would've gone down in a heartbeat. Refusing the exchange didn't necessarily serve a purpose, but it does prove that Stalin was a cold, uncaring dickhead.

Stalin refused to exchange his son for a field marshall, not hitler's nephew I think. He famously said "I will not trade a Marshal for a Lieutenant". But there were father's who were more sentimental as well, and plenty of female rulers in history were cold-blooded as well, look at Catherine the great who had her own husband killed.

[Damar]

I still don't see how she justified the action of releasing Jaime, the man who openly admits pushing Bran out of a window, on the very very gaint hope that Tyrion, the one who apart from being the one she kidnapped and put in a Sky cell for several days is the least influential Lannister sibling, would give back a hostage as valueable as Sansa. Instead, the only thing it caused was the Northerners losing their most valueable hostage, the murder of two others and cause the Karstarks to turn against Robb.

[brashcandy]

I want to point out this is wrong. The freys, martells, and lannisters all allow there bastard children to live at the ancestral home, and are given various roles as part of the family.

The weird thing to me is why Ned never fostered Jon out. Ned himself was fostered, as are many young nobles, including lord hornwood's bastard. It would get Jon away from catelyn and I imagine any one of his vassals (manderly, umber, mormont, flint, Tallhart) would have been happy to take Jon.

It must have had something to do with what he promised Lyanna... perhaps he felt Jon would have been safer living at Winterfell in case any one knew the truth of his paternity?

I still don't see how she justified the action of releasing Jaime, the man who openly admits pushing Bran out of a window, on the very very gaint hope that Tyrion, the one who apart from being the one she kidnapped and put in a Sky cell for several days is the least influential Lannister sibling, would give back a hostage as valueable as Sansa. Instead, the only thing it caused was the Northerners losing their most valueable hostage, the murder of two others and cause the Karstarks to turn against Robb.

Yeah Cat really stepped outside her bounds here. She was desperate to get Sansa back, but desperation doesn't count as an excusable war strategy. As for the argument that I think Errant Bard (?) made earlier that she did it behind Robb's back so that he could be absolved from the blame, whilst reaping the benefits, I don't see the logic there. If anything, she severely undermined Robb's leadership and put in an awful position without his most valuable hostage. A lot of things could have been avoided if Cat would have just sat down and thought logically about things before she acted.

[flame7926]

She was justified in ignoring him. He was a bastard. He was not her child, she had no obligation to be a mother figure, or even nice to him. I don't even think that Ned ever asked her to. She also said that thing in Jon's bedroom after her husband had gone away, and her son was in a coma, and her sisters husband might have been murdered by the kings wife. Also, if you take all the emotion out of the sentence, it makes logical sense for her to want that, she didn't know if Bran was going to die or not, and if Jon had died there would be no other claim to Winterfell besides her children.

[lyvyathan]

She was justified in ignoring him. He was a bastard. He was not her child, she had no obligation to be a mother figure, or even nice to him. I don't even think that Ned ever asked her to. She also said that thing in Jon's bedroom after her husband had gone away, and her son was in a coma, and her sisters husband might have been murdered by the kings wife. Also, if you take all the emotion out of the sentence, it makes logical sense for her to want that, she didn't know if Bran was going to die or not, and if Jon had died there would be no other claim to Winterfell besides her children.

In whose world? She was the wife of Ned Stark, the Lord of Winterfeld- a devout man who believed in honor etc.. She was required to love and obey him and respect his decisions.

If you read the books carefully, you'd realize that Catelyn did more than just ignore Jon. She made him - since he was a baby - unwelcome in his father's household. Everyone knew that she hated him and made it uncomfortable for him to live there.

True if she was a Cersei who would have likely smoothered the babe in the cradle with her bare hands - but the way she treated Jon was not LOGICAL - it was EMOTIONAL.

If she was really logical she would have convinced Ned to foster him out to the Karstarks or one of their bannermen. She could have returned back to Hoster Tully's castle with Robb and threatened not to return until Jon was fostered out of Winterfell.

If she was really logical she should have treated Jon kindly loving her like a son - so that in the future he may likely NOT stick a dagger into her heirs or slit her throat when she was blind and old.

If she was logical and concerned about his threat to her own children - she could have arranged for him to die as a babe. Poisons it seems were common in those days. And babies and young children die all the time in those days.

Instead, she makes cruel japes and openly shows her dislike for Jon- if she was honorable she should have taken it out with Ned himself - not the child. Can you imagine growing up with Catelyn as your step-mother? Think about it for awhile.

Taking our her emotional frustration and anger on the child is not logical nor even justifiable - its mean, cruel, and a stupid thing to do. What hope can she gain by antagonizing and making Jon her enemy? One day he's going to grow up - and what then? Is he going to be her ally or enemy? By saying cruel and awful things things to him she's practically making sure he's the latter.

The picture painted of Catelyn Tully by Martin shows a stupid bimbo, a foolish stupid emotional woman who does things based on her gut feeling and is easily manipulated. She is many things - but she is definitely not logical. People say that she thinks too much - aye, mayhaps, but so do my goldfish when I go to the fish tank at 9am - they know its time to feed. In fact, they've been thinking about food all day long.

Cat's foolish emotional behavior is exhibited throughout the series. Kidnapping Tyrion on a flimsy pretext, jeopardizing her husband and her daughters (who she apparently didn't bother to warn) by that ad hoc decision, and later releasing another chief hostage for a mere promise, If I was Robb I would have had her head chopped off for allowing the chief hostage to escape.

[lyvyathan]

Yes, I have. Have you read the post I replied to? It was all about how awful it was from Cat to ignore Jon.

You have a funny way of expressing it then.

What's so wrong with Cat ignoring someone who was not her child? I honestly don't get this.

[Dragonfish]

If she was really logical she would have convinced Ned to foster him out to the Karstarks or one of their bannermen.

If you read the books carefully, you'd know that she did try to convince Ned to send Jon away, but he refused. Why should that be her fault?

Instead, she makes cruel japes and openly shows her dislike for Jon- if she was honorable she should have taken it out with Ned himself - not the child. Can you imagine growing up with Catelyn as your step-mother? Think about it for awhile.

Can you imagine if your spouse came home with someone else's child, never told you who his other parent was, told you that he had to be raised and cared for in your household, and would brook no argument over the subject? How do you think you'd act around the child if this happened? I'd like to think I'd treat the child well, but if this scenario actually happened to me I might very well treat the child coolly, especially if I were living in an era where the child might one day contest my own children's inheritance rights.

The picture painted of Catelyn Tully by Martin shows a stupid bimbo, a foolish stupid emotional woman who does things based on her gut feeling and is easily manipulated.

It's sentences like these that lend credence to the argument that Cat-haters are sexist.

You have a funny way of expressing it then.

I think you need to re-read what David Selig actually said.

[lyvyathan]

If you read the books carefully, you'd know that she did try to convince Ned to send Jon away, but he refused. Why should that be her fault?

Can you imagine if your spouse came home with someone else's child, never told you who his other parent was, told you that he had to be raised and cared for in your household, and would brook no argument over the subject? How do you think you'd act around the child if this happened? I'd like to think I'd treat the child well, but if this scenario actually happened to me I might very well treat the child coolly.

It's sentences like these that lend credence to the argument that Cat-haters are sexist.

I think you need to re-read what David Selig actually said.

Mayhaps its not her fault by failing to convince Ned - but as a Princess of House Tully she had options available to her if he refused. ie Returning back to Lord Hoster's castle with Robb as a babe until such time as Ned complied.

She could have easily done it - she could have claimed that her sick father required her presence - or feigned any plausible excuse - then gone back to Daddy's home... or better yet, bring Ned and Jon along so that Hoster could chastise his son-in-law and "persuade" him to let him foster the bastard.

See that would be a logical thing to do - but taking out your angst and frustration on a helpless child is not logical - its emotional.

You say you would treat the child coolly - now where would that come from? Is that a logical decision or an emotional one?

Hey, don't call me sexist - I don't know you - you don't know me. I'm only thinking logically about Catelyn's position. Calling a kettle black so to speak. You can love Catelyn - but you can't say that what she is doing is logical.

There are many women I like and respect in the book - Asha is one of them - she was smart enough to recognize that Winterfell could not be defended - unlike Theon who was thinking emotionally about the place.

And of course I like the whores - particularly the pretty ones - who doesn't? See, I'm thinking emotionally there. :D

[Dragonfish]

Mayhaps its not her fault by failing to convince Ned - but as a Princess of House Tully she had options available to her if he refused. ie Returning back to Lord Hoster's castle with Robb until such time as Ned complied.

You're contradicting yourself. You said above that Catelyn "was the wife of Ned Stark, the Lord of Winterfeld- a devout man who believed in honor etc.. She was required to love and obey him and respect his decisions." Now you say that she ought to have defied Ned's will in order to push him toward sending Jon away? I mean, you're basically saying that Catelyn ought to have respected Ned's decisions, and then blaming her for not doing more to defy Ned's will. Seems to me that she's damned if she does, damned if she doesn't in your eyes.

See that would be a logical thing to do - but taking out your frustration on a helpless child is not logical - its emotional.

You say you would treat the child coolly - now where would that come from? Is that a logical decision or an emotional one?

I never said her response was logical. It was very much emotional. But that doesn't necessarily make her stupid, or a bimbo (which, by the way, is a pretty loaded term that has virtually no male equivalent, so it's best to avoid using it altogether, especially in a Catelyn thread). Everyone acts based on emotion to varying degrees, yet women seem to bear most of the criticism for acting "emotional", while men are often left off the hook for it. That just seems fundamentally sexist to me.

Hey, don't call me sexist - I don't know you - you don't know me.

I think we're all sexist, to varying extents. It's pretty much impossible not to be in our society. But I at least try to recognize when my beliefs contain some latent sexism, and I also try to recognize it in others. Your comment happened to set off red flags for me. Perhaps I'm being unfair to you in this particular instance, but when you have one poster saying that Catelyn proves "most women don't make good battle commanders," and another one saying that she's a bimbo, it's hard for me not to see latent sexism in that.

[moonjump05]

If you read the books carefully, you'd realize that Catelyn did more than just ignore Jon. She made him - since he was a baby - unwelcome in his father's household. Everyone knew that she hated him and made it uncomfortable for him to live there.

She didn't want him there, that's the point. Maybe Ned should've seen the horrible way he was treating his wife's feelings and do everyone a favor and foster Jon out - like she asked him.

Instead, she makes cruel japes and openly shows her dislike for Jon- if she was honorable she should have taken it out with Ned himself - not the child. Can you imagine growing up with Catelyn as your step-mother? Think about it for awhile.

Please remind me when Cat is making cruel japes about Jon.

And Cat is not his step-mother. She has no obligation to him at all. She didn't marry her love Ned knowing he would foist his bastard into her house and accept it. She had an arranged marriage to a stranger, went to the cold desolate north with no family or friends, and had to live with a legitimate threat to her own children. She could make Ned miserable, but he is her husband and she most likely knew that would be making her own life more miserable.

The picture painted of Catelyn Tully by Martin shows a stupid bimbo, a foolish stupid emotional woman who does things based on her gut feeling and is easily manipulated. She is many things - but she is definitely not logical. People say that she thinks too much - aye, mayhaps, but so do my goldfish when I go to the fish tank at 9am - they know its time to feed. In fact, they've been thinking about food all day long.

This doesn't even deserve an answer.

Ned could've prevented this fiasco by fostering Jon to one of his bannermen, and should've when his wife asked him too. If R+L=J, and he did it to keep his promise, then he needed to be more logical and send Jon away instead of emotionally keeping his nephew around and making said nephew and his wife antagonistic.

[lyvyathan]

You're contradicting yourself. You said above that Catelyn "was the wife of Ned Stark, the Lord of Winterfeld- a devout man who believed in honor etc.. She was required to love and obey him and respect his decisions." Now you say that she ought to have defied Ned's will in order to push him toward sending Jon away? I mean, you're basically saying that Catelyn ought to have respected Ned's decisions, and then blaming her for not doing more to defy Ned's will. Seems to me that she's damned if she does, damned if she doesn't in your eyes.

Its not a contradiction -Cat has two roles - one as mother to her children, and the other, wife to her husband. Sometimes the two roles maybe in conflict with each other.

As I see it she has two choices to make:

1. Wife: Respect Ned's decision and live with it and NOT take it out on the bastard child

2. Mother: Leave with her begotten child when she found out about the bastard child - and force Ned's hand to foster the child out.

Unfortunately the diplomatic aspect of 2 - was beyond Catelyn's abilities and mindset. If she had a mind like Littlefinger- she could have worked something out - but she's just Cat - and doesn't possess the intelligence for that kind of scheming. So instead she takes our her frustration on the bastard child. Wow, well done harpy.

The 3rd option which she chose to have - ie. taking it out on the child is the emotional choice and the stupid one. As I mentioned before she's deliberately and willfully antagonizing a potential enemy for no reason other than to sate her frustration.

I'm not saying its not understandable - in the same way as understanding why Jamie and Cersei have sex in the most inappropriate places.

But trying to defend her decision as logical is the same as defending Joffery decision to publicly humiliate Sansa Stark. I'm sure there can be found reasons to rationalize his bullying. I just don't see them as logical, only emotionally driven.